The Decisions We Make
by Dark Akuma Hunter
Summary: Batman might not have had the conviction to do what Jason asked, but Nightwing sure as hell did. He would not lose his little brother again.


**A/N: Don't mind me, I'm just typing out my feels. Anything you don't think is canon - relationships, for example - is from me watching Young Justice. Sorry for any confusion.**

**The Decisions We Make:**

Yes, Richard had graduated from being a Robin, moved on long before Bruce crossed paths with a young Jason Todd, but that didn't mean he didn't care. As Nightwing he had his duties, had responsibilities outside of Gotham, away from the territory of his adoptive father, but that never stopped him coming to visit.

Jason had been an odd kid, sure, with a slightly darker nature which only presented itself as he grew older, but Richard could understand that. He knew what it was like, to want harsher vengeance and to be at odds with Bruce about the way they dealt with crime. Obviously Bruce's methods didn't work as well as they might have liked, but he abhorred unnecessary death, and Richard wasn't a big fan of killing either, and had never made his passing thoughts known.

That was where the two differed.

Jason had no problem expressing his discontent with how Bruce handled Gotham's crime scene. It was something Bruce would, in rare moments of _emotion_, confess his worry about when Richard was in town to speak to. Richard would listen, but rarely spoke in return, because he had been there, on both sides of the fence, and even then he wasn't certain which side he'd rather be on. It was a slippery slope.

Watching Jason grow was a strange experience for Richard, because this was his little brother in all the ways that mattered. The new Robin, Bruce's new ward, one more member to their small little family.

But then Jason died.

Richard had been torn up about it for months; Bruce locked away the majority of his emotions and never stopped blaming himself.

For five long years they wallowed in all sorts of self-hatred, doing their best to fight crime in their respective cities, always remembering that fourth member of their family.

Every time over those five years that Joker broke out of Arkham – because he always did, nothing could keep him there forever – Richard had to stamp down on the urge to rush over there and beat the shit out of the man who had had the nerve to kill his little brother. But every single time he clamped down on the urge, unsure of whether it would be honouring or tarnishing Jason's memory.

His resistance did little to ease the oppressive grief that had yet to dissipate.

When he got really down in the dumps, he'd wonder why he hadn't been keeping track of Jason, why he hadn't made an effort to go after him himself – what if he'd made it there before Bruce had? Jason could still be alive.

The Red Hood? Instant suspicion.

He was a bad guy, yes, but to be perfectly honest? Crime rates were down. A lot. Gotham didn't do low crime rates. Bruce had never made much of a dent in the numbers – if anything they _increased_, from criminals trying to get back at him.

It had made Richard curious, made him wonder, and so he came out to Gotham to see it for himself. When he realised Bruce didn't know, not really, he'd slipped and told him, only barely hanging back and keeping quiet about his own personal opinions of the newest Crime Lord.

Seeing the Red Hood fight? He would never forget that. It was undeniably impressive, and so very obviously the result of hard training. The sort of training you would only get from Bruce, because how else would he have been _so certain_ that his knife would cut through Batman's cables? He mentioned nearly as much while Alfred bandaged his leg – he wasn't even sure how he'd been injured, a rookie mistake.

"Go home," Bruce had told him, dismissing him due to his injury. Richard wasn't about to sit around and let Bruce tell him what to do, not this time. He wasn't a little kid any more, he wasn't Robin; he could make his own decisions, and he was sure the city could cope without Nightwing for a few more days.

So he stayed, and he watched, and he made his own conclusions.

Joker was out again – his blood ran cold at the thought – and was wreaking havoc, _again_, but the Hood... Richard watched their interaction on the bridge from the sidelines. They knew each other. Or rather, The Hood knew Joker, but Joker didn't know who was behind the mask. Bruce knew, and so truthfully so did Richard, because he wasn't a genius hacker for nothing.

But really? Was it really Jason?

The facts said yes, but at the same time the facts said no.

It didn't matter how. If Jason was alive, then Richard could finally have his little brother back.

* * *

What he stumbled upon was not what he had expected – he should be used to surprises by now, hadn't that been proved enough just this last week?

Richard arrived just in time to hear Jason berating Bruce for letting Joker walk free. He should have known. He _should have known_ that would have been what Jason wanted. He had let Bruce's opinions sway him away from justice, from vengeance, when it was all he had wanted. There had been a time when he had wanted nothing more than to tear Joker limb from limb, but Bruce had held him back.

No-one noticed his entrance, absorbed as the were in their argument. Joker waggled his eyebrows in Richard's direction, pale and bloody, and Nightwing sneered at him, disgusted. Because he was the origin of all their problems, the twisted pale clown at his feet.

Jason threw Bruce a gun, dragging Joker up from the floor and holding another gun to the clown's head. It wasn't hard to guess what he was going to do.

"It's him or me," Jason threatened, and like every other word that had ever come from his mouth, Richard knew he was serious. Bruce seemed to know it too, but even so, he tossed the gun away, and Richard watched as it slid across the old floorboards, coming to a stop when it bumped into his foot.

His heart leapt into his throat. Bruce was just going to walk away. After everything that had happened, he'd rather let Jason become a killer than destroy the person who had ruined all of their lives.

He wouldn't have it.

Kneeling down Richard picked the gun up and flicked off the safety. He knew how to shoot, even if it was normally tranq darts. If he hadn't, he might have been more nervous – it was an odd angle.

"I told you," Richard said darkly, speaking up for the first time. They both whipped around to look at him, surprised. "I told you we should have killed Joker. He has been nothing but a plague on this country, on the world!"

There was a spark of something in Jason's masked eyes. Was it... appreciation?

"Nightwing..." Bruce warned, trying to keep a dying secret until the very end.

"Shut up!" Richard snarled, holding the gun firmly and taking aim. He didn't care if Bruce hated him for this, didn't care if it would make him a criminal in his mentor's eyes. He was ending this horror story.

Joker laughed, eyes bright, filled with psychotic joy. It was probably a wonderful way to die for an insane person who only enjoyed bringing Batman pain.

Richard pulled the trigger.

The gun-shot was loud in the run-down apartment.

Jason's face was covered in blood, but he smiled all the same, dropping Joker's lifeless body to the dirty floor.

Richard smiled back, affection for his long-lost brother overwhelming the small nuances of shock racing through him. He had just shot someone in cold blood, and he didn't care one single bit.

Bruce stared at the two, torn between happiness, disgust and disappointment.

That moment changed everything, but what exactly that meant for the eclectic family, only time would tell.


End file.
